TORONTO, Aug. 22, 2024 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — The Animal Protection Party of Canada is calling on Canadian authorities to follow the U.S. government’s lead and ban the import of endangered monkeys from Cambodia for use in Canadian laboratories.
In November 2022, the United States suspended all shipments of primates from Cambodia after the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service filed charges against Cambodian government officials and nationals for an alleged monkey smuggling ring that falsely passed off wild-caught cynomolgus macaques, which are listed as endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, as being bred in captivity.
Since the U.S. suspension of imports, imports of cynomolgus macaques from Cambodia to Canada have increased, with thousands of these monkeys being brought into the country over the past 19 months.
On Friday, August 9, 2024, the Canadian Transportation Agency denied landing permission to a cargo plane carrying long-tail macaques from Cambodia because it appeared to be in violation of International Air Transport Association guidelines. The following day, August 10, the plane landed at Montreal-Mirabel Airport – 48 hours after the animals were loaded. CITES Canada and the Canadian Wildlife Enforcement Directorate have been contacted to clarify what action should be taken.
Canada is a signatory to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) and should impose an immediate ban on all monkey imports from Cambodia until the problem of illegal trade is resolved.
“Canada has no excuse for willfully ignoring the conservation concerns raised by the likelihood that these are wild monkeys trafficked through a breeding facility, the humanitarian concerns raised by animals confined in crates for extremely long periods of time, or the zoonotic disease concerns associated with the importation of non-human primates. Beyond that, the entire practice of mistreating our fellow primates in this way should be a source of shame,” said Barry Kent MacKay, Director General of the Animal Protection Party of Canada.
“This is an opportunity for Canada to form a common front with our U.S. counterparts,” MacKay said. “It’s time to show the world that we are not participating in the commercial exploitation of an endangered species.”
Contact:
Barry Kent MacKay, Managing Director
Animal Welfare Party of Canada
905 472 9731 | [email protected]
